1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a facsimile apparatus, and more particularly, to a facsimile apparatus comprising means for continuously transmitting plural groups of image data to another facsimile apparatus of the same receiver or destination party without disconnecting a transmitter thereof from another facsimile apparatus of the same receiver party through a communication line when it is judged that the plural groups of image data are to be transmitted thereto.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Conventional facsimile apparatuses are equipped with a timer reservation function for transmitting image data to a facsimile apparatus of the other party or destination party selected beforehand at an appointed time.
A facsimile apparatus of this type is driven in a manner as will be described hereinbelow.
When a document is placed onto a document tray of an automatic document feeder unit (referred to as an ADF unit hereinafter), a transmission reservation key is depressed, and then, a telephone number of the facsimile apparatus (referred to as a facsimile number hereinafter) of the other party and an appointed time are input. Then, the following depression of a timer reservation key allows the ADF unit to send a plurality of documents to an image reading part one by one, whereby image data of a document image read by the image reading part are stored in an image memory. At the appointed time afterwards, the facsimile apparatus of the outgoing party is connected with the facsimile apparatus of the other or receiver party through a telephone line. As a result, the image data stored in the image memory are read and converted to predetermined facsimile signals, which are transmitted to the facsimile apparatus of the other party through the telephone line. Thereafter, the line with the facsimile apparatus of the other party is disconnected when the image data of all the documents are completely transmitted thereto.
In a conventional facsimile apparatus connected to only one telephone line, when first image data are to be transmitted while second image data are being transmitted, since it is impossible to send the first image data promptly, the first image data are temporarily stored in an image memory for a transmission reservation, automatically. Thereafter, when the second image data are finished to be transmitted, the first image data are transmitted to a destination.
Further, according to the conventional practice, if a subscriber telephone line of a facsimile apparatus of the other party is occupied and busy, image data to be transmitted are temporarily stored in an image memory for a retransmission. In the event the line connection with the other party is impossible even a predetermined time later, re-trials for the line connection therewith are arranged a preset number of times.
However, in the conventional facsimile apparatus of this type, even when a destination party to which further image data are to be transmitted by the above-mentioned timer reservation, the above-mentioned transmission reservation or the above-mentioned retransmission is the same as a destination party to which image data are being currently transmitted, it is necessary to connect with the same destination party through a communication line again after disconnecting the communication line with the same destination party, and to transmit the above further image data thereto. Therefore, it is a waste of time to disconnect the communication line with the same destination party once and to connect with the same again, resulting in lowering the transmission efficiency of the image data.
Moreover, since the communication line with the above same destination party is disconnected once, an incoming call from another facsimile may be received while the line is being disconnected, and then, it becomes impossible to connect to the facsimile apparatus of the above same destination party through the communication line.